Aging

Aging naturally diminishes the effectiveness of body systems at producing energy and strength on demand. It is necessary to compensate for metabolic and structural changes of the body in order to harness the energy for creativity and continued learning. Getting the basic things done to meet daily needs, unless you have hired help or a dedicated helper in your life, becomes more challenging. This can sap energy from learning and adaptation to inevitable change. 

Conservatism is the easy route. Retrenching into habits and traditions can be a symptom of stress from aging. It can also be a symptom of fear of mortality. We are feeling the strain of this dynamic in society with our growing elderly population in the U.S.. Elderly people readily respond to fear-mongering by those conservatives who wish to manipulate them politically for their fiscal agenda. The irrational opposition of people receiving government insurance (Medicare) to the recent attempt to develop a reformed, one-payer government health insurance is a prime example of fear trumping reason in the older mind. The proposed reforms would not have significantly effected Medicare, which is a successful health insurance program, run by the U.S. government. In fact, the reforms would have made Medicare work more efficiently and fairly. Panicked older voters turned out in force to vote against health care reformers.

Age-ism in American society is revealed in the media's easy sell of plastic surgery, erection-enhancing drugs and life insurance policies for the elderly. Cosmetically enhanced and relatively athletic men with bleached smiles trot proudly while revealing that they have high cholesterol. Women with cosmetic enhancements proudly proclaim that they are mistaken as a sibling when with their daughters. The subtle message that natural aging is a bad thing is easy to transmit to people afraid of aging and death in a society where inter-generational living is rapidly disappearing in favor of retirement communities, in-home medical care for poorer, isolated seniors and assisted living complexes for the wealthy.

I hope the development of humanist communities will continue to place a value on inter-generational conversations and shared activities. My own experience of the Gay Liberation movement made me painfully aware of the great lack of inter-generational community within the GLBT subculture. Age-ism and homophobia go hand in hand, just as age-ism and sexual repression go hand in hand. It took the horror of the AIDS epidemic to bring some inter-generational segments of the gay community together for a common good. Yet, as the threat and lethality of HIV subsides, I see the inter-generational divide widening in the GLBT community once again.

As an aging humanist, I see inter-generational interaction as absolutely necessary for my practice as a developing human being. Unlike those who see themselves as venerable because of a list of material achievements, I feel I must work harder against the disadvantages of my aging to remain a vital and contributing member of an inter-generational community. I must embrace learning curves rather than presenting myself as the ever-sagacious teacher. It is an upward climb, not a view from above it all. Along the journey, I may have something to share from experience that may help my younger companions, but they have just as much to teach me about their understanding and perception of the world we share, the world they will be shaping when my time has passed.